campuspowerful

If your purchase of Office came with a product key, you enter your product key on one of the websites listed below for your version of Office. After you enter your key, you can download and install Office, or you can renew your Office 365 subscription.

1. Office 365 Enter Activation Code
2. Office 365 Code Not Working

Example of an Office product key:

XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX-XXXXX

Office 365, Office 2019, Office 2016, and Office 2013 (PC and Mac)

Step 1: Go to www.office.com/setup

Step 2: Sign in with your Microsoft account, or create one if you don't have one. Be sure to remember this account so that you can install or reinstall Office later, without a product key.

Important: If you're renewing an Office 365 subscription, enter the Microsoft account that's associated with your subscription. I can't remember my Microsoft account.

Step 3: Enter your Office product key, without hyphens.

Step 4: Follow the prompts to finish the redemption process.

Microsoft HUP

These steps apply only to Office Professional Plus, Visio Professional, or Project Professional.

Step 1: Start an Office app, like Word, Project, or Visio, depending on your purchase.

Step 2: In the Sign in to set up Office window, select I don't want to sign in or create an account (it's a small link at the bottom of the window).

Step 3: Enter your Office product key, without hyphens. If you don't have your key, see get your HUP product key.

Microsoft Store

Step 1: Go to www.microsoftstore.com and sign in (upper right-hand corner) with the Microsoft account that you used to buy Office.

Step 2: After you sign in, select your name in the upper right-hand corner, and then select Order History.

Step 3: Locate the Office one-time purchase or individual Office app, and then select Install Office to view your product key (this doesn't actually install Office).

Step 4: Select Install Office again in the window where the product key appears.

Step 5: On the Hi. Let's get your Office page, follow the prompts to sign in again and associate your product key with your Microsoft account.

Office 2010 or Office 2011 for Mac

Step 1: Go to https://www.microsoft.com/software-download/office

Step 2: Enter your Office product key without hyphens, and then select Verify.

Step 3: Follow the prompts to finish the download process.

Office 365 Business Premium

Step 1: Go to https://www.office.com/setupkey

Step 2: Enter your Office product key without hyphens, and then select Next.

Step 3: Follow the prompts to finish the redemption and setup process.

Having problems with your product key?

I can't find my product key

For help with finding your product key, select your version of Office below:

Office 365 Enter Activation Code

My product key isn't working

First, make sure that you're entering the key correctly on the right site. If you aren't sure which site to use, you can enter your product key using the Virtual support agent (English only). If your product key is valid, the Virtual support agent provides a link to download Office. The Virtual support agent can also let you know if your product key has been blocked and can connect you to a live agent.

If your Office product key doesn’t work, or has stopped working, you should contact the seller and request a refund. If you bought a product key separate from the software, it’s very possible the product key was stolen or otherwise fraudulently obtained, and subsequently blocked for use. Unfortunately, there are many dishonest sellers who offer stolen, abused, or otherwise unauthorized Microsoft product keys for sale. Sometimes these product keys are printed on counterfeit labels or cards with a download link to Microsoft software, and sometimes they’re distributed with software media that is unauthorized for resale, such as promotional media, original equipment manufacturer reinstallation media, or other Microsoft program-specific media.

Contact support

If you still need help with your product key, visit our Microsoft support page for help.

Office 365 allows (*) any user to install all Office applications (currently Office 2016) for which he/she has been granted a license on up to 5 devices; if the user installs the applications from the Office 365 portal, the installed software is automatically linked to his/her user account; if instead the Office Deployment Tool is used, the software is not automatically activated, and the user is asked to sign in to Office 365 when first starting any Office program, in order to activate it.

This is all fine and good, but what to do if you want to change the associated user account for an Office installation? If UserA used PC1 and thus the installed Office software on PC1 has been associated to UserA's account, and now PC1 must be given to UserB, how can I re-associate that Office installation to UserB without having to reinstall the whole package?

(*) Depending on the subscription plan.

2 Answers

Subscription-licensed copies of Office are associated with the user's Office 365 account. Even if you reinstalled Office, that does not remove the computer from the original users's account. It's Microsoft's servers which are the canonical source of the subscription/activation info.

You need to deactivate the Office instance in the Office 365 Portal. Once that happens, the installed copy of Office will deactivate on the client. In my testing, the client shows a 'subscription expired' pop-up the next time Office is opened. However, there might be some lag for the client to detect the deactivation (e.g. If the PC has no Internet connection when it is deactivated).

Once the 'subscription expired' message appears, the new user can enter their Office 365 credentials to activate the install in their name.

Office 365 admins can list the activated Office 365 ProPlus installs for a user and deactivate them via the user accounts list in the admin portal. This is a relatively new feature, so you may find a number of outdated blog posts and documentation that says users must deactivate their installs individually.

Regular Office 365 users can self-manage their ProPlus installs by signing into the Office 365 portal (portal.office.com). So they can take care of deactivating old installs on their own without admin intervention.

I must point out that what you are trying to do seems like a pretty pointless exercise, unless the first User has hit their 5 device limit and needs to deactivate an old PC move on to a new one.

One of the major benefits of subscription-licensed Office is you are pretty much always compliant with the licensing, as long as you have Office 365 ProPlus subscriptions for all of your users. In your example above, it does not matter that 'UserA' has activated a copy of Office on a PC being used by 'UserB'. Just make sure you have licenses assigned to all of your users in the Office 365 admin portal.

Also, note that the activation portion of Office 365 ProPlus is independent of the 'sign into office' feature (the username in the top right of the Office application). It is perfectly valid for UserB to be signed into Office even though it was activated by UserA.

If UserA leaves your organization, then you just need to unassign their license in the admin portal (which you should be doing anyway as part of your offboarding procedure). That will deactivate UserA's install, requiring UserB to activate.

If the computer is shared by multiple users (a terminal server or a student lab), then you should look into Shared Computer activation. But this is not necessary for regular PC turnover.

In my organization, I haven't bothered with deactivating during normal PC turnover, until a user hits the 5 device limit. Then we login to the portal and clean out old PCs they are no longer using.

• Students get the immense benefit of improving memory power after the Om Namah Shivaya chanting. The frontal area of the human brain is in the Orbito prefrontal cortex which is responsible for making decisions, problem-solving and awakening the consciousness gets charged. Om namah shivaya movies.

Use ospp.vbs. It seems that osaui.exe /f is no longer an option after Office 2010.https://community.spiceworks.com/how_to/48973-remove-and-re-add-license-key-for-office-2013-on-office-365

Office 365 Code Not Working

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged microsoft-office-365activation or ask your own question.